Touching Infinity
by Nolaquen265
Summary: There's a void inside you: inescapable, ever present. Infinite. You don't know how to fill it: with pleasure, with friends, with quiet contemplation? In the end, how do you go on when you know that something so vast exists within you?


A/N: I don't own Digimon.

XxXxX

You sit on the old playground swing in the park, your dim eyes set on some distant point in space, and effortlessly ignore the curious glances thrown your way. The couple walking past watches you out of the corners of their eyes for another few moments before their interest expires, and they return their attentions to clasped hands and whispered nothings.

Your remote gaze, breaking its link with a different sort of nothing, drifts after the well-dressed pair until the lovers have passed out of sight.

"What I wouldn't give," you muse to yourself, "to be able to live like that again. Content with the moment."

Giving yourself a little push with your feet, you, Takato Matsuki, swing through a small arc several times before returning to a rest.

"…able to go through the motions without asking questions… and looking for answers…"

The breeze rustles through the leaves above, but no one else is there to appreciate it but you—and you've already pondered the wind many times before, and found it lacking.

"…able to blind myself with everyday life… and all the little things that go with it…"

In the distance, you hear the sound of children at play—unfiltered innocence in the sandbox, hidden from a broader world.

"…able to live without looking _beyond…_"

A much broader world.

If you had any energy left, you'd be riled by frustration. But those lesser passions are all spent now on lesser things, so you merely sit and stare into infinity.

Well, it's not really infinity.

You've seen that endless expanse a few times now, and this isn't it. Your memories don't do it justice, but what your physical eyes are feeding you is most definitely normal.

And that's part of the problem, really.

"Then again…" you start once more, murmuring to yourself, "…I'd still feel the tug, wouldn't I? Not so much, but it's not going to leave a human being that easily."

Ah well; it's a loaded question. Is being consumed by the desire for ultimate truth—though you'd settle for penultimate truth, if that's what you've observed—any worse than living something resembling a well crafted lie? A role where you have choices, sure, but where the best choices are kept out of reach?

…you don't think so, but that may just be you.

Maybe other people like the idea of living out life like the characters do in books. Without, you might say, substance in the truest sense of the word.

After a while, you tense your leg muscles, then release—pushing you into another half-hearted imitation of a perfect circle.

"…I think real love is infinite."

It's a random thought, brought on by that carefree couple walking by, but it fits into the grand scheme of things, somehow.

"…it must be, really."

No justification needed there; it's as self-evident to you as the principle of inalienable rights was to the men who once wrote a very famous document. That is, a scrap of paper—or was it parchment?—which has somehow touched on an idea that helps make the world go 'round.

It's only one of those Ideas, you think. But like the rest, it's a good one. A true one. A beautiful one.

Depressing, isn't it? To live in a world of dead shadows and ghostly reflections of Something beyond your comprehension. And yet, It lingers just out of sight, if only you look closely enough.

But if you _do _try to peak behind the curtain, then It fades away like mist in your hands.

And so you sit here alone, talking to yourself about that comforting sort of nothing: spontaneous thought, which is about as lighthearted as you've been in months.

Or maybe it's years. Time's slippery, too, these days. Now that you've glimpsed Time—note the capital T—that fourth dimension we all live by in this realm is too subjective to put any stock into.

"Stocks are down, too."

You chuckle to yourself, not knowing why. By all accounts, besides coming out of the blue, your little joke doesn't make much sense. Ah well; you can say that about a lot of things these days.

On the other hand, those things also make a _lot_ more sense, now. Once you've caught sight of the tools that the universe was measured and built with, bounded by… the mundane things are a lot clearer.

Hand in hand with that little distinction in perception come the flaws, though. Still, you don't think that'd be a problem if only you weren't constantly comparing the 'real world,' as they call it, with the supernal.

Is that a good word to use? It implies something spiritual, you think. Maybe it is, but it's also more down to earth—if you can get away with that pun—than a drug-induced vision or a state of misplaced passion.

Not to say it's all bunk. But truthfully, the real absolutes, actual _Order_, encompass more than piques of emotion and sentiment. There's reason there, a set of rules that, when you take it to the natural conclusion, sum up everything in the 'verse. That is, all that _is._ There's a framework, where things fulfill, and are fulfilled by other things that exist beyond this speck of a mirror we call earth.

Where were you?

Ah, yes. Lamenting a world that lives in the Dark Ages of awareness, along with your inability to cross that final chasm.

You were also swinging on this rusted child's equipment, which is a lot simpler than anything else. Except maybe falling off a bike, which is significantly less painful than coming so close and then losing it all like a dream.

Of course, what good does this brooding do you? Ponder everything all you like, there's not much you can do about it. For one thing, you're out of touch: you can't even remember the last time you had a meaningful conversation with anyone. No one can help you think this through.

That's not so much your fault as it is theirs, though. Even before you started peering through the looking glass, you weren't being taken very seriously. Why should they give a second's thought to your musings?

Hey, look, there's Takato Matsuki.

Poor, clumsy kid; he might have saved the world once, along with his little friends, but look at him now.

Baker's boy, running errands with his head in the clouds.

His friends are shaping up just fine, though; nice, productive members of society who want to support the masses.

Bet he still wishes they could go back to that other world with their monster pals and fight some big bad guy one more time, though.

Just for old time's sake.

…damn it, that's not what this is about. If you could bring Henry, Rika, and everyone else with you when you gaze into eternity, you'd do it a heartbeat ago. Maybe with more minds, however small all of yours are, you'd actually figure things out. Reconcile them.

And it's not about the glory days, either. This may be bigger than anything you ever dreamed of, but there's no self interest here. Self interest just doesn't exist beyond the line you've toed.

Antitheses crumble when they've passed the boundaries of the universe, and you know for a fact that 'something bigger than yourself' is one of those vague, wispy little terms which describes the Beyond so well.

Heh. If you had a nickel for every name that you've come up with for this force-of-nature-outside-of-nature…

…look at that. The sun's set. The sky's on fire with crimson and gold. Good colors; they used to be your favorites, before you saw the absolutes governing everything, including those little things like frequencies of light. After that, nothing can compare…

Hm. This looks familiar.

You must have seen this sight a dozen times before from the seat of this swing. Yeah, that sounds accurate.

…no…

…it's a thousand times.

…over ages and eons and forever and ever and…

Oh.

I see.

It's Infinity.

I can never tell when you'll be back.

You seem so much closer now. Or maybe it's just me.

…is it Time? At last? I hope…

…so close…

Oh—

xxxxx

You're not complete.

There's still a part of your soul yearning for that final end to all things.

But you can live with the separation for now.

You've touched Infinity, and it's shown you the path to walk. And it leads into the Light.

Do you dare to tread that road?

Then Follow.

XxXxX

A/N: I know. But it doesn't have to make sense, at least at first. Or ever.

Please review; I like to hear all your thoughts on what I write, regardless of what you or I say. Confused, inspired, puzzled, etc.? Well, that's nothing new in the grand scheme of things. Heh.


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